Do Robots Go to Heaven?
by RandyPandy
Summary: "...R-Shadow?" "Yes Quint?" "Do Robots go to Heaven when they die?" "...I don't know." R-Shadow and Quint. -Pre-RM&F2, Future-


Disclaimer: I do not own Rockman at all. This fanfic has simply been written to be shared.

Warning: Tearjerker. Character Deaths. If you don't like it... don't read it. Simple as that.

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><p>Everything had seemed so much simpler yesterday, he had believed. Yesterday, he and the Dimensions had split up, with him ordering them that if they found the little boy, to bring the kid to him, so that he could kill him herself. He'd searched for the kid through the empty, messy streets. Most of the city's population had either already fled, or been killed by him, whether they'd been human or not. They were better off that way.<p>

But now, as he stood over the boy next to a battered red playground slide, could he really kill the child? The boy didn't even seem to realize he was there, and seemed to be quite filthy, as if he hadn't washed himself in days.

Rockman Shadow sat down, taking his helmet off as if it was the very object that was obstructing his vision of the Quint. Slowly, he reached out, putting his hand on Quint's shoulder as if to check for life.

"Quint?"

There was no response at first. For a moment, R-Shadow wondered if he was already dead. Then Quint stirred a bit, opening his eyes partly. The teenager robot slowly set his helmet down next to Quint's helmet, an odd laptop device, and the broken Mechaniloid pogostick, but didn't remove his hand from his half-sibling's shoulder. Finally Quint spoke.

"...You finally came?" the small voice was barely a whisper. "I was waiting..."

R-Shadow didn't know what to say to that. Quint had been expecting him? He was very relieved to see the boy alive; for some reason, it had stirred feelings of fear when he had thought that Quint was already dead. He tried to justify that it was because he wouldn't get to kill his little half-sibling himself, but... if that was so, why wasn't he killing the child already?

Quint rolled over, his head moving to R-Shadow's lap. The teen moved as if to jerk away, but stopped himself at the last moment. Something was wrong. This... could this kid really be Rockman? He'd heard tales of the young robot he had been built to destroy, and later of how his creator had kidnapped the boy. But this kid... he was definitely a product of this age, not a childish, happy-go-lucky boy like the one had heard tales about. Quint was nothing like the Rockman of the old.

It sickened him. How someone could change so much.

He should just kill the boy now. But something stopped him.

"What were you waiting for?" he found himself asking instead.

"You."

"Me?" How could Quint be waiting for him?

"Y-You... years ago, you told me we'd meet... that you'd be the one to do it." Quint smiled at him, his blue eyes glassy and broken. "I've been looking forward to meeting you for that... but I guess I got impatient."

The child winced, placing a hand on his hand and rubbing it as if in pain. Unconsciously, R-Shadow found himself placing the child in a more comfortable position on his lap, and began petting his hair.

"You seem to be in pain. Are your systems malfunctioning?" R-Shadow asked.

"Sorta..." Quint admitted, curling in on himself.

"Sort of?"

"They're on lockdown."

R-Shadow's eyes widened. Why would they be on lockdown? Usually, a lockdown was a special set of codes, or circumstances, that were designed to completely wipe out a damaged computer, and leave it to be freely programmed again. To put a robot on lockdown was complete cruelty.

"You let somebody install a lockdown?"

"N-No... it happened nearly seven years ago... when Dr. Wily kidnapped me, he needed some way to control me..." Quint's voice was getting much more slurred, so it was becoming harder to understand the child. "I was sick of it... sick of everything... so I did something that I knew would activate it..."

"You gave up." R-Shadow's voice was flat. There was nothing in him that showed he was happy with or upset with Quint's actions. "After all these years of what you did, you gave up. Why?"

"Had nothing to live for... they were all dead... Dr. Light, Protoman, Roll, all of them..." The boy stared, somewhat blankly, up at R-Shadow, as if seeing him but not really seeing him at the same time. "I was just... waiting for you now, honestly."

"..." Why did he feel sorry for this child? This boy had had a worse life than he did. At least he had never been born as a slave to humans, like Quint had been. Absentmindedly, he began petting Quint's hair in an attempt to soothe him, shifting the other's body. He stopped when the other flinched, though.

"P-Please... i-it really hurts down there..."

"It... does?" Usually when a robot was on lockdown, their head hurt, not their lower torso. "Quint, why is your jumpsuit torn down there? What happened?"

"...Nothing happened."

"..." He didn't question further. He knew that Quint was lying, and he knew enough to know what exactly had happened to this child. A small, defenseless little child had gone through something no robot or human should. "What was their name?"

Quint muttered something, closing his eyes. R-Shadow's eyes narrowed.

"I'll remember that name." He didn't know, honestly, whether he would find them. Most likely he'd already killed the person.

"...I'm not worth it. You don't have to do anything for me."

"Yes you are."

What on Asimov was he saying? And to Quint, nonetheless? He really did feel something for this child. Was it pity? For everything that he had gone through, and had still remained so kind-hearted? Broken, yes, but still kind-hearted enough not to wish harm on anybody despite what they did to him?

R-Shadow quickly glanced around, searching for a topic of interest. His eyes landed on the red Mechaniloid pogostick, and he gestured to it. "Quint, what is this?"

"That was Saku."

"Saku?"

"Sakugarne, my best friend... I guess you could say he was the only one that stuck around with me, no matter what happened..." A few tears slipped out of the boy's eyes, and R-Shadow slowly wiped them away. "He's dead now, though. Dead. He's... going to st-stay dead... d-died a couple w-weeks ago wh-when..."

But unlike most children, Quint didn't burst into tears. He just lay there silently, glassy eyes staring at Sakugarne, like a broken doll. R-Shadow couldn't suppress a shiver as he looked at Sakugarne. That was a dead Mechaniloid that Quint had been carrying around for weeks, like a dysfunctional security blanket. It was somewhat eerie... and illogical. System malfunctions would do that.

"And that?" R-Shadow asked, this time, pointing to the laptop device. Quint shifted his head to look at it.

"That's the Time Skimmer..."

The Time Skimmer. The very object that he had been looking for. The one that would allow him to go back in time, and have a much better chance of finding Rockman as he had been, and Dr. Wily. It was there, within his grasp. He could take it, and Quint would be in no position to fight him and try to take it back. It would be very easy, and even if the child somehow put up a fight, he could always just kill him.

And yet, he hesitated. "I see."

"You can have it."

"What?" That was not what he had been expecting the other to say.

"You're gonna need it... if you're going to be how I remember you." Quint smiled up at him again, fixing him with that glassy gaze.

"..." R-Shadow took a deep breath. Sure, Quint said that he needed the Time Skimmer to be how he remembered him, but he couldn't help but wonder...

Had he... met Rockman... fought him... and lost...?

"You're not a bad person... I know you're not." Another wince, and a grabbing of his head. It seemed to be much more intense this time, with actual whimpering. R-Shadow, for his part, just pulled the kid into his arms and hugged him, not knowing what else to do. He felt helpless, for the first time. He couldn't save Quint, he knew that, but he didn't want him to die because of a stupid lockdown program.

"...R-Shadow? Brother...?" the child whispered, amidst his pain-filled cries.

"Yes?"

"P-Please... k-kill me..."

"...! What?"

"I can't... I can't g-go on l-like this... it r-really hurts, p-please..." Reaching out, Quint grabbed R-Shadow's sleeve, and his glassy blue eyes met the other's shocked red ones.

"I... Quint..." He'd been planning on taking the boy to the other Dimensions to see if they knew a way to get around the lockdown program that he hadn't. But could he really do that, if Quint didn't want to live? He wasn't even sure whether the boy had much longer, with that program, anyways. It would be cruel to keep a broken, wounded child alive if they didn't want to live.

"P-Please... I kn-know that i-it'll hurt... f-for a few moments... b-but..."

R-Shadow took a deep breath, and repositioned Quint on his lap, holding him with one hand. The other hand went to the hilt of his saber, and activated it. He held it over Quint, who stared at the light blue blade without a hint of fear in his eyes. Instead, he seemed to be waiting. After what seemed like eternity to him, and possibly Quint, R-Shadow pushed the tip of the saber directly into Quint's core. It was euthanasia, he told himself. It was just like euthanasia.

The child's eyes widened, shuddering. He seemed to be in intense pain, and even R-Shadow could tell that his systems were trying to work around the lockdown program to keep him alive. The boy's eyes, still filled with pain, fixed themselves on R-Shadow's face again.

"R-Shadow...?" He spoke, his voice much more strained and slurred then before. It was even starting to break up.

"Yes Quint?"

"D-Do robots... go to... heaven... when they... die...?"

"...I don't know."

"I-If there... w-was one... w-would I g-go...?"

"I think you would. You're a much better person than some of those people that were 'good' enough to go."

"Bro...ther... Thank... you..."

"You're welcome."

R-Shadow deactivated the saber and held Quint close, cradling the child. When the boy didn't respond anymore, and his body suddenly went limp in his arms, the teenager looked down. Quint's eyes were still open, but unlike before, when there had been a very dim spark of life, there was now nothing. He shivered, and set the dead, destroyed, broken child down, gently closing the other's eyes.

"...Goodbye, brother."

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><p>Author's Notes:<p>

-This fanfic was mainly written as background for a Classic Rockman-series-based RolePlay that I am a member in. It can be found at roboticuprising (dot) proboards (dot) com or at roboticuprising (dot) deviantart (dot) com.

-The person that attacked Quint was Starman. Yes, freakin' Starman. I blame the RP. Which is epically depressing.

-I love this fic, but at the same time, hate myself for doing this to Quint.


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